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If, then, the Intellection is an act upon the inner content
[of a perfect unity], that content is at once the Idea [as
object: eidos] and the Idea itself [as concept: idea].
What, then, is that content?
An Intellectual-Principle and an Intellective Essence, no concept
distinguishable from the Intellectual-Principle, each actually
being that Principle. The Intellectual-Principle entire is the
total of the Ideas, and each of them is the [entire]
Intellectual-Principle in a special form. Thus a science entire
is the total of the relevant considerations each of which, again,
is a member of the entire science, a member not distinct in space
yet having its individual efficacy in a total.
This Intellectual-Principle, therefore, is a unity while by that
possession of itself it is, tranquilly, the eternal abundance.
If the Intellectual-Principle were envisaged as preceding Being,
it would at once become a principle whose expression, its
intellectual Act, achieves and engenders the Beings: but, since
we are compelled to think of existence as preceding that which
knows it, we can but think that the Beings are the actual content
of the knowing principle and that the very act, the intellection,
is inherent to the Beings, as fire stands equipped from the
beginning with fire-act; in this conception, the Beings contain
the Intellectual-Principle as one and the same with themselves,
as their own activity. Thus, Being is itself an activity: there
is one activity, then, in both or, rather, both are one thing.
Being, therefore, and the Intellectual-Principle are one Nature:
the Beings, and the Act of that which is, and the
Intellectual-Principle thus constituted, all are one: and the
resultant Intellections are the Idea of Being and its shape and
its act.
It is our separating habit that sets the one order before the
other: for there is a separating intellect, of another order than
the true, distinct from the intellect, inseparable and
unseparating, which is Being and the universe of things.
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